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If you’ve spent any amount of time on the EzineArticles Blog, you know that making article writing and marketing part of your overall marketing strategy is a smart decision. Yet surprisingly, many people who frequent this Blog still haven’t fully embraced the benefits of article marketing.

We’ve heard a lot of different reasons why they’re hesitant to fully commit to an in-depth article marketing strategy. Some have merit, but most are based on myths or misunderstandings about the reality of article marketing. Here are the top 4 objections we’ve heard over the years and the reality behind the misconceptions:

Objection: “Article marketing takes too much time.”Reality: All good forms of marketing take time. Yet when you start to see a return on your time investment, it all becomes worthwhile. You will also find that once you gain some experience with article marketing, your time investment will drastically reduce.

Objection: “I don’t know how to get started with article marketing.”Reality: Getting started with anything can be a daunting task if you’re flying solo. The good news is that you don’t have to do by yourself; EzineArticles can help accelerate your learning curve. We’ve developed a great suite of writing tools and resources on our website, and with your help, we’ll continue to develop even more that will benefit you in the future.

Objection: “I have to be a Search Engine Optimization (SEO) expert to really reap the benefits of article marketing.”Reality: We hear this on occasion here at EzineArticles, but it just isn’t true. Sure, there are a few SEO techniques that will help you gain additional exposure, but it isn’t rocket science, and can easily be learned in a short period of time.

Objection: “I’ll be penalized for duplicate content.”Reality: Some Expert Authors worry that they’ll be penalized by search engines if they reprint their content on multiple platforms. Search engines created the ‘duplicate content penalty’ concept a decade ago to discourage webmasters from duplicating the same content on the same site (rightly so). They only want to display the best article for each search query – which means, they have become very efficient at determining which article delivers the best result for their user without including identical articles in the search results. If you re-write your articles, or at least make changes to your articles before submitting them to multiple sites, you will greatly increase your chances of having the search engines re-index your articles, and will avoid the dreaded “duplicate content penalty”.

Time and time again we’ve heard reports and testimonials from ordinary men and women who have achieved extraordinary results … turning their high quality original content into high-value traffic back to their website.

We know that the EzineArticles system works, but it’s not a “get rich scheme” like some people would like to believe. Instead, it’s a highly structured and foolproof way of consistently driving more and more highly-targeted traffic back to your website while simultaneously increasing your exposure and credibility in your niche.

What can the power of article marketing do for you?

We recently introduced Rob Charles, Director of Online Education, who is currently putting together a 10-module training system that will make it easy for anyone to add the power of article writing to their marketing tool box.

The fact is that there are no guarantees when it comes to marketing. Yet, there are over a quarter million business owners who are currently using article writing and marketing to effectively grow their businesses – and they’ve been doing it successfully for years!

Why has Article Writing and Marketing withstood the test of time? Because these Expert Authors/business owners are getting results – and the reason is pretty easy to understand with a simple mental exercise:

Imagine for a moment what receiving 1,000 monthly article views would do for you and your business if you had an average click through rate of 3%. Your 1,000 views would deliver 30 highly-qualified prospects back to your website each month. After one year, that equates to well over 360 qualified prospects to your site since readership typically increases the longer an article stays on our site. In addition, as you submit more high-quality articles, your traffic numbers will continue to grow exponentially, month after month, year after year.

Once again, I’ve asked Rob to contribute some tips to this post. In Wednesday’s Blog post, he shared 5 tips for getting started with article writing and marketing. Today, he brings us 5 tips for driving traffic back to your articles and website.

Rob’s 5 Tips for Driving Traffic Back to Your Articles and Website:

Write Quality Articles – Presenting high-quality content is the first step in establishing a level of trust between you and your readership. Be conscious of the power of that trust and how it’ll help you position yourself as an expert in your field.

Create a Quality Resource Box – A carefully laid out Resource Box can make a dramatic impact on the amount of traffic you’ll receive. It’s your way of allowing people to find you, so make sure your name, website URL and any social media URL’s are present. Of course, don’t go overboard and include more than 2 self-serving links in your Resource Box. This will cause your article to be rejected.

Limit Your Articles to 500-800 Words – Long introductions, drawn out article bodies and lasting conclusions will cause you to lose your audience quickly. In most cases, it’s appropriate to break articles of 1,000-1,500 words or more into 2 unique articles.

Utilize Social Media – Link your articles to social media sites like Facebook and Twitter to exponentially increase the amount of traffic to your articles. EzineArticles automates this for you within your account so you can set it … and forget it.

Use Your Article to Build Trust and Authority – Don’t use the article body as a selling platform or you’ll lose your readership before you even have a chance to build your relationship with them. Instead, keep any self-serving content in the Resource Box.

There you have it, 5 tips that you can start using today to drive traffic to your articles and websites.

Do you have any other tips that can help drive traffic to your articles? Please leave a comment, and share your input with the rest of us.

Most don’t send us 100% of their original content, but rather a percentage of it. I don’t think there is much harm in submitting 15-45% of your original content.

If you want to further lower your risk, rewrite a percentage of your content and submit a different version to sites like ours.

If you want to go even further to remove risk, create a series of dozens, hundreds or thousands of articles that you only create for the purposes of syndication and do not include them on your own website.

If you want zero risk, remove all of your content from your website and shut it down because even when you don’t syndicate your content, some people will steal it and then you’re in the same situational risk that you currently perceive yourself in… the idea that you might receive a penalty because you’ve shared your content.

The upsides to sharing your best original content outweighs the downside risk to potential unfavor. Just stay focused on what’s in the best interests for your users (ie: Your ideal customers). :)

If you have a simple landing page, article marketing is the way to go. Google has changed its Adwords rules regarding landing pages. Your resource box on your article is the way to go.

I often put my articles in the article section of my web site. I alter the article somewhat. I modify my first paragraph as a start.

I also put in keywords where I substituted words before so I could abide by the rules. For instance, when I write spiritually oriented articles I will often use the word “God.” I will often substitute Higher Power or the Divine. I go back to “God” when I put them on my web site.

If you are starting out, go to the article templates on the left. They will really get you going.

Trust yourself. You know more than you’re aware of. Just because you know it doesn’t mean everyone else knows it. Share it.

And … it feels good to see that “Article Accepted” notice in my in-box. That in itself is a great affirmation.

Cathy, Well said and helpful. I was wondering about the types of changes I should make since I have many articles to draw from already on my site (and in folders waiting to see the light of day – yikes!)

Chris, you are probably right that we needn’t spend so much time with the issue of duplicate content, so much as getting content – fresh, new thoughts and ideas – out of our heads/folders and into the world!

Yes, Marte I think it has been said before that you can submit articles from your blog or website for as long as they are your originally – see, this is where this issue of ‘duplicate content’ and ‘duplicate articles’ comes in – here is the differnce between the two; a ‘duplicate article’ is an article that is submitted to the same publisher twice, and Duplicate content refers to an article being published on multiple pages on the internet and usually is associated with how search engines perceive an article that is published on many sites.

Well, great tips once again. As for me, it used to be the case of the confusion regarding the terms ‘duplicate content’ and ‘duplicate articles’ impedeing my aticle writing, but that beast has since been laid to rest and I shouldn’t have any good excuse now lol.

I think it’s just a case of getting my priorities right. There are just so many things competing for my time – it’s a question of managing self.

B.) Paragraph on what people believe about this industry, why folks believe that.

C.) Use a word such as;

Ironically,
However,
Actually,

And then complete a paragraph of why this is NOT the case, and what the reality is (in reality,)

D.) Next, you need a couple of pragraphs to add to your article in a “boomerang” fashion, stating why the objection is false, and why the exact opposite is true.

E.) Lastly follow-up by reminding people that its okay to have believed that falsehood prior, as many people do, but now they know the truth and thus, should act on that knowledge now.

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I want to thank the Ezine Article Team for presenting this blog so that I might discover this great new template for my next batch of articles to continue driving quality targeted traffic to my website.

Article marketing is pretty much the cornerstone of my marketing campaign. Don’t get me wrong I still participate in link exchanges, directory submissions, social bookmarking, and forum posting, but nothing compares to article marketing especially on this website. Good post on destroying the myths of article marketing downsides there is a reason thousands of webmasters and bloggers publish articles on websites besides their own.

Blog articles need more alterations and corrections before submission to EzineArticles, since the scrutiny is very strict at EzineArticles. Some times the entire body is changed and a different picture is projected. In case of blog you are independent and no body verifies it before posting. You will get sufficient opportunity to edit and hence no question of duplication.